How Corporate Sharewashing Practices Undermine Consumer Trust

Florian Hawlitschek; Nicole Stofberg; Timm Teubner; Patrick Tu; Christof Weinhardt

doi:10.3390/su10082638

,

and

¹

Department of Economics and Management, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, 76133 Karlsruhe, Germany

²

Faculty International Strategy and Marketing, University of Amsterdam Business School, 1018 TV Amsterdam, The Netherlands

³

Einstein Center Digital Future, Technical University of Berlin, 10587 Berlin, Germany

⁴

Faculty of Mathematics, Informatics and Statistics, Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich, 80539 München, Germany

Sustainability2018, 10(8), 2638;https://doi.org/10.3390/su10082638

This article belongs to the Special Issue Sharing Economy and Its Role in Fostering Sustainability: How Trust and Regulation Shape Relations of Providers and Consumers

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Abstract

Sharewashing describes a platform’s act of misleading consumers by purposely portraying an image of social and ecological principles while the platform’s business model does not necessarily involve them. Drawing on Corporate Social Responsibility and Green Marketing literature, we propose and evaluate a research model for investigating the impact of sharewashing perceptions on consumer trust. Based on survey data from 145 millennials, our results reveal a significant negative effect of sharewashing perceptions on consumer trust, partially mediated by perceptions of risk and confusion. We discuss our findings in view of their practical and strategic relevance to sharing economy platform operators.

Keywords:

sharewashing; sharing economy; trust

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